


Severance

by anonymousgratification



Category: Batman - All Media Types, DCU (Comics)
Genre: Blood, Dissociation, Hurt/Comfort, Panic Attacks, Violence
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-02-26
Updated: 2019-02-26
Packaged: 2019-11-05 23:23:18
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,753
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17928329
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/anonymousgratification/pseuds/anonymousgratification
Summary: There's nothing but blood.





	Severance

**Author's Note:**

> I've had this idea in my head since I read Teen Titans Annual or whatever, however many weeks ago that was, and tonight I was finally able to conceptualize it.  
> Dami and Jason have so many correlations, and I really feel it's a waste how it's not explored.  
> Anyways, I'm just pleased with myself I was finally able to write this. The prose is intended to be a bit frantic, epitomizing the mindset of Damian. I think it's sometimes overlooked just how traumatized and conditioned Damian is. I feel omissions and slips wouldn't be unusual for him. I mean, he was desensitized to killing and trained to do so for a large percentage of his life.  
> xo  
>   
> 

He’s craving it. Thirsty and greedy for blood and bones. He wants to feel it. He wants blood pooling at his feet and composing the space around him. He can taste iron on his tongue. His vision is blurry, out of focus and tinged red. Red. Red. Red.

His hands aren’t moving anymore. He fights it, the suppression. His wrist are behind is back; someone’s holding him. Who? Why?

“Robin. It’s me.” The words are warped and Damian can’t latch on to them. He doesn’t understand; why the feeling is gone.

Grayson holds his forearms together, tighter.  “What happened?” he asks. His mouth is too close, tickling his neck. Damian hates it; the sensation. It’s air instead of liquid.

Damian struggles and kicks, hitting Grayson. He escapes his hold and turns around, his fingers wrapping around his throat and squeezing. He doesn’t know who this is in front of him. He looks like Grayson, but he also doesn’t; his face is distorted and twisted. His features are melting down his face, turning into ichor.

“It’s me. Nightwing,” Grayson’s face is shocked, contorting and deforming as his mouth moves. Grayson seizes Damian’s wrist, not pulling away, even though he could. Damian’s still small enough that he could push and shove him away, but he doesn’t. He holds Damian, and Damian’s suddenly aware that he’s shaking, opposite to Grayson’s hand, firm and unmoving on his wrist.

“Damian,” he says his real name and Damian feels sick, registering. Nightwing. Grayson. Richard. Right in front of him; his hands on him.

Damian grabs Grayson’s wrist around his with his other hand. He needs something solid; something real to secure himself against.

“Le…” He tries, but his voice is gone. It feels like blades inside, burning and stinging as he tries to make his throat move.

“Let go,” he forces his lips to move, forces the words out. His voice sounds different, like it’s muffled through water.

Dick trusts him, letting go first, and Damian drops his arm from his neck. He flinches away from his hand, like its scorching, burning under his fingers and in his palm. He looks down, his eyes flitting around them, trying to establish where he is. Bodies littered behind and around him. So many. Too many. Puddles and stains of blood. Are they dead? He doesn’t know. He can’t think. It’s unbearable, unacceptable; too much.

Damian closes his eyes and puts his hands over his ears, trying to make it go away. Shut up. Shut up.  _Shut up!_

He’s a monster. A demon. A villain. He’s nefarious and a  _failure_. He’s exactly he thought he wasn’t, what he was hoping he’d never become again. He hears his grandfather’s voice. His mother’s.  _This was inevitable. You’ve only been pretending this whole time; playing the part of a hero. This is who you’ve always been. Who you were always meant to be._

"Damian? What is it? What happened?" Damian can’t hear him. He can only hear the voices. His own voice and Grayson’s, saying words he never would. He can hear the cracking. Feel the blood. He’s sticky and stained with it, never to be clean again.

Damian opens his eyes, looking at Grayson.  _Sorry_ , he wants to say.  _It was an accident. It wasn’t me._

_ But who was it, instead?  _

Damian feels like he’s going to pass out; Grayson’s body angled toward him, his eyes roaming over him, checking him. It’s not _him_  he should be worried about.

Damian opens his mouth. He’s going to be sick. He’s going to lose consciousness. Everything is blinking white, black dots circling in his vision.

He’s going to die, if he stays here. Damian turns and runs, swinging onto a building from the ground.

Grayson calls for him, but he doesn’t hear it. He tries to follow him, but he doesn’t see it.

Damian swings back to the ground, moving on instinct. He’s on autopilot. His body is moving, but he swears it’s not him who’s moving it.

His thoughts are simple. Loose. There’s a place near here. Safehouse. There’s nothing in his head but getting there.

Damian’s hands are shaking as he enters the code, the concrete underneath him spinning and hard to stand on. The door is big and hard and Damian just wants to be on the other side of it.

He gets the door open after what feels like hours and shuts it behind him, his hands splaying against it. He tries catching his breath. He can’t. It’s too hard. He doesn’t remember how to breathe. He doesn’t know if he ever knew, doesn’t know how he used to execute the action.

He stumbles deeper into the house, not glancing at anything. He takes his mask off, going straight to the bathroom. He can’t see. It’s too restricting. It’s too hot and there isn’t enough air.

He needs to clean himself off, bleach away this blood and his wicked insides.

He opens the door and hurls it back, shutting. He can’t hear the sound—nothing but blood in his ears. He sets his mask on the bathroom counter and looks up.

His eyes go to himself in the mirror. All he can see is red again, all over his face, spilling down his cheeks and out of his mouth. Those eyes aren’t his. They don’t look quite right, like Grayson’s face and the room around him. Everything is rippling, the world flickering like a light. He wants to flip it, on or off, he doesn’t care— he just wants it to stop.

There’s blood on his face. Everywhere. He looks down at his mask, but it’s red instead of green. There’s blood on the mirror, seeping out of the walls.

_Who is that?_  He stares ahead. He hates the person in front of him.

He growls, his teeth clenching together. Go away. He punches the mirror, wants his own blood to replace everything else. He wants to feel it, the shards of glass imbedding his skin. He punches again. Again. Again. Go away.  _Go away._

He wants to rip it off the wall— wants to feel it shatter. He wants that person to leave. He drives his hands into it, hitting until it smashes. He’s unsteady and the sensation makes him wobble— he’s too distracted and falls back onto the ground. He tries to breathe again, staring up at the glass and fragments around him. He looks down at his hands. Blood. Bleeding. Throbbing. Pulsating.

He can feel everything. His heart beating. His blood flowing. His brain hammering. His stomach twisting.

He crawls to the toilet, just feet away, and collapses over it, throwing up.

Hate. Hate. Hate. He rests his head on the side of the seat. It’s cold. Firm. Solid. Like Grayson’s hand earlier. It’s  _real_ , directly underneath him.

Damian’s eyes are bleeding. He thinks it’s raining the liquid when drops fall and add to the toilet, but it’s clear.

Tears. Not blood. Something else solid. The world is coming back. The room around him. His eyes linger, lidded, his head still on the toilet. Shards of glass. His mask by the sink.

Damian’s choking again— coughing. He’s real. This is real. Everything that has happened and keeps happening. He heaves, throwing up again.  _This is real._

He lifts his head, grimacing at the way it’s pounding. He flushes and closes the seat, lolling against it.

Cold. Firm. Real.

He sits up, leaning back against the wall, bending a knee, his other leg straightening. He tilts his head back, staring blankly.

_ Fuck. _

His eyes are wet—tears not blood—he reminds himself. He rubs his hands over his face, sinking into his hair.

He runs them through his hair down to his neck, and then lifts them in front of him. It hurts. They hurt. Something else solid—pain.

He watches the blood trickle through the fabric, the green stained dark. The material is ripped, and it’s red everywhere, and Damian can’t get away from blood.

He wants it to go away.

~

Jason comes in through the window. He’s aware of the way it’s set up; the connected numbers, but he can’t be bothered to remember. 

He’s brings his hands up to his mask and takes it off. He’s about to shrug off his jacket, but he hears an indecipherable noise. He centers on it, following the sound, moving closer and closer, until he’s directly in front of the bathroom door. It sounds like someone is hyperventilating. Someone is mumbling and he tries to listen but it’s all incoherent. He shoves the door open, aiming his gun into the room.

“What—” He stops, finding Damian huddled in the corner, his head in his knees, the bathroom destroyed. There’s blood on the mirror, shards and crimson covering the floor.

Damian lifts his head, tears spilling down his face, dried blood blanketing his forehead and down his cheeks.

Damian opens his mouth, his face washed out and colorless. Jason lowers his weapon, placing it in the holster.

“Damian? What happened?” He leans down in front of him.

Damian flinches when he’s closer, so Jason stands again, taking a step back.

Damian doesn’t speak, just stares up at him. He looks disconnected, like he can’t follow his words.

“Were you drugged?” Jason’s words sound fake, twirling and twisting in Damian’s ears. He can’t grasp it; anything about this. Why him? Why here?  _Why?_

Damian puts his face in his hands, hoping that when he looks back up, Jason will be gone. His breath hitches repeatedly. He can’t breathe again.

“Dude… What’s wrong with you?”  _Everything_ , Damian wants to say.

He shakes his head;  _no_. Jason untenses; finally a reaction.

“Damian, look at me.  _What happened?_ ” He sounds concerned. Damian looks up—he shouldn’t be. Damian’s not the victim, he’s the demon. He should be  _afraid_.

Jason’s stands, motionless. He’s not sure what to do; not good with this sort of thing, especially not when it’s Damian. He tries again.

“You can tell me. I don’t care what it is,” he softens his voice. Damian still doesn’t talk, but he opens his mouth again like he wants to.

“If you won’t talk to me, I can call Dick. He’ll know what to do,” he suggests. Damian’s face looks frightened, somehow even more panicked. Jason turns to walk away, set on talking to Dick, but Damian stops him.

“No,” his voice is weak. Damian can’t think of the words; they’re jumbled and blending together. He’s not speaking English. It’s Arabic, and Jason’s relieved he knows the language.

“Don’t, please.” Jason staggers. He’s  _never_  heard that word from him.

“Why? Did something happen? Is he ok?” Jason looks around again, wondering what the hell did happen.

Damian’s quiet again. Jason feigns, turning away.

“If you won’t tell me, I’ll just have to ask him.”

“I fuck… fucked up.” Damian’s slurring, still not in English. “I didn’t hurt him,” he asserts, sounding like he’s apprising himself.

Jason turns back around and sits on the floor a couple feet in front of him.

“Tell me. I won’t care,” Jason speaks Arabic too, paralleling him.

“Blood,” he says. He sounds like a child, younger than Jason’s ever heard him. He looks down at his hands. Jason watches him, his attention completely on him, observing the way they are quaking. Damian clenches his fists, trying to stop the trembling.

“Blood?” he asks, but it’s the wrong thing to say. Tears gather in Damian’s eyes again, and he shoves the bottom of his palms into them.

“Sorry,” he mumbles. “I’m trying. But I can’t understand until you say something.”

“I hurt them.” Damian puts his hands on his forehead on each side of his head, then lowers them.

“Who?”

“I don’t know,” he answers as soon as Jason talks. He’s silent for a moment, and Jason waits patiently for him to continue. “Everyone.”

“Not Dick.”

“No.”

“Did you try to?”

Damian shakes his head up and down slightly, his eyes damp and rimmed maroon. Jason sighs; he’s a little too familiar with this distinct type of hate and guilt.

“You tried to hurt Dick? On accident?” He asks, but Damian doesn’t answer, and he expects the silence. “On accident,” he confirms. “Because you didn’t know who he was?”

“He looked different. His face was—” Jason cuts him off. He knows. He knows exactly what he’s going to say.

“You stopped yourself.”

“Almost too late.”

“Almost too late,” Jason repeats, feeling that sentence skewing through his heart and stomach. A sinking sensation binds him to Damian and staples him there. He understands completely.

“I wanted to,” Damian adds. Jason feels a little angry; either that Damian’s so consumed with something intimate to him, or because no one else should have this feeling.

“He’ll forgive you.”

“He shouldn’t. I would’ve—”

“You didn’t,” he reassures, his voice definite. Damian doesn’t speak, shame and culpability biting into his heart and engulfing it.

“You went on a rampage?” he asks, but he also needs to know, needs to hear Damian’s admission.

Damian answers, indirectly. “I wanted to hurt them.  _Kill_  them.”

“I wanted their blood,” Damian looks ashamed, divulging to him.

“Blood,” Jason recites, assimilating Damian’s earlier uttering.

“I could see it.  _Feel_  it. Everywhere. It’s still…” he drifts off.“I can’t feel anything else. Nothing but the feeling.”

Jason doesn’t know what to say. Damian starts crying again at his silence, his sniffling filling the room.

Jason moves closer, until they’re just inches apart on the floor.

Damian attempts to stabilize his voice, but it still sounds like sob. “I didn’t mean to,” Damian explains himself, but he doesn’t need to—not to him.

“I know.” He does. He doesn’t doubt that Damian didn’t mean to— didn’t intend to be powerless to the urges. He didn’t intend to be unable to defy his years of conditioning and acclimatization. Jason looks into his eyes, trying to reveal to him that he believes him, that he doesn’t blame him. “I know,” he says it again, to attest.

“I can’t… I don’t know how to… I don’t know what’s real.” Damian lowers his gaze, wishing to recoil somehow from what he just said. Jason doesn’t need to know; not all the things swimming through Damian’s head and drowning him.

Jason leans closer, taking a risk by putting his hand on Damian’s cheek, his fingers going to his hair.

“This is real. I’m real,” he says. He needs to secure Damian, needs to convince him by making him feel something tangible.

Damian winces, but he doesn’t shove him off. His eyes are dewy and virescent, peering into Jason’s. His gloved hand has a specific, familiar texture, and Damian focuses on the contrast to his skin.

Jason lifts one of Damian hands, puts it around his wrist, placing his fingers so he can feel his heart beating.

“I’m real. There’s blood flowing inside me. Where it’s supposed to be,” he promises.  _You didn’t hurt me,_ lingers under his words, the meaning manifesting in the compact space of the bathroom, where they are sitting.

“My hearts beating. My lungs are working.” Damian curls his fingers, gripping his wrist.

“I’m alive.” He lifts Damian’s other hand, placing it on Damian's chest. He holds his hand there, Damian’s hand under his, feeling the beating of his heart. It makes Jason more cognizant; makes him grasp the weight of this more competently.

“You’re alive,” he tells Damian, reminding him.

Damian stares up at him. _Something concrete. Something real. Something firm_. The thumping of Jason’s heart under his fingers and his own heart beneath his hand.

Damian’s breathing again. He merges his inhaling and exhaling with the thumping.

They sit there for minutes, listening and feeling the sensation of their hearts beating in tandem.

Jason relinquishes his hold when he feels Damian’s respiration go back to normal; his heart no longer beating rapidly. He pulls away and sits next to him, reclining against the wall. Damian leans his head back against the tiles, the color on his face back to what it should be, pink from his lingering upset.

“Are you ok?” Jason queries after a period of silence.

Damian nods;Jason sees it in his peripheral. He speaks after a moment.

“Aren’t you…”  _Scared? Scared of me?_ Jason can hear the words before they come; doesn’t want to make him say it.

“No.”

“You should be,” Damian insists, but Jason doesn’t say anything. He shouldn’t be, and Damian knows that, too.

They sit in silence, the world going back to what it once was.


End file.
